Why the Anatomy Lab Remains a Fixture of Medicine

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NEW YORK — For hundreds of years, physicians have been dissecting
the dead to learn about the inner workings of the human body.

While the subject matter itself hasn't changed much, the study of
anatomy has been steadily advancing — both in terms of the tools
available to clinicians and the ways in which educators and
students approach the material. Yet amidst these changes, there's
no replacement for the hands-on
experience of the anatomy lab, physicians say.

Many people think the purpose of the anatomy lab is for students
to simply learn the nomenclature for the parts of the body, said
Todd Olson, an anatomist at Albert Einstein College of Medicine
in New York. This is certainly part of the purpose — "anatomy is
the foundation for the language of medicine: the language
health-care professionals use for communicating about patients,"
Olson said. But it's not the only reason. [ Image
Gallery: The Oddities of Human Anatomy ]

One of the most valuable aspects of the anatomy lab experience is
gaining an appreciation of human variability, Olson said. "I've
been teaching and studying anatomy for over 40 years, and I've
never seen a live or dead person that looks like an
anatomy book, because every picture in an anatomy book
identifies the 'average' condition," he said. "But none of us are
100 percent average." These differences include those between the
old and young, between men and women, and from person to person.

Whereas the anatomy lab remains a cornerstone of
medical education, other parts of medical teaching have
changed in recent years. As the amount of medical knowledge grows
— for instance, with vast advances in medical imaging — medical
curriculums must grow to keep pace, which ultimately means less
time for each concept. Many medical schools have reduced the
amount of time spent in the anatomy lab, and some even provide
predissected cadavers (called prosections) so students don't have
to spend time doing it themselves.

Technology plays an increasing role in the lab these days, too.
At NYU School of Medicine, for example, students use a digital 3D
software program called the
BioDigital Human as a complement to their manual dissections.
Technology can be helpful in anatomy education, Olson said, but
it’s not going to replace dissection. "Dissection is something
that is very real. It is happening to the remains of a once-human
being, it is not something that is easily replicated on a
computer screen." [ Ready
for Med School? Test Your Body Smarts ]

Also in recent years, anatomy educators have pushed to focus on
only the most clinically relevant aspects of anatomy — what
doctors will use in the real world. Rather than having medical
students learn every structure in the human body, it's more
important they learn about how different parts relate to medical
conditions, Olson said. The American Association of Clinical
Anatomists, of which Olson was the past president, was founded in
order "to bring together anatomy educators around the country who
are part of this revolution in how anatomy is presented to
health-care professionals," he said.

At most medical schools, students take an introductory gross
anatomy course in their first year. But at Einstein College of
Medicine, some students return to the lab several years later,
during their medical residency. Einstein runs an anatomy lab for
residents in the physical rehabilitation program of nearby
Montefiore Hospital — a kind of refresher course, as well as a
chance for residents to augment their clinical experience.

"I think more and more schools and hospitals are realizing that
they want to add this kind of additional education for
residents," course director Sherry Downie, a professor of
clinical anatomy and structural biology at Einstein, told
LiveScience.

During the course, the residents study the musculoskeletal
system of six major body areas: wrist and hand; shoulder;
head and neck; lumbar spine; hip; and knee and ankle. They spend
several sessions reviewing the basic anatomy, and then they have
a chance to practice clinical tests on medical student volunteers
acting as patients. This allows the residents to see how the
various body systems function in living humans, then go back to
the cadavers to gain an internal view of the relevant body parts.

For example, the resident might want to test for carpal
tunnel syndrome, a painful condition caused by a pinched
nerve in the wrist. The resident could perform "Phalen's
maneuver," a diagnostic test for this condition, on the living
volunteer patient, and then look at the nerves themselves on a
cadaver. "We'll see something in our patients and we'll say, 'Why
is this happening?' We'll go straight to that organ or that joint
and we'll inspect it on the cadaver and find out what's going
on," said third-year Montefiore resident Antigone Argyriou, one
of the students in the anatomy course.

In the clinic, you can see that patients are in pain, but you
can't see what's going on underneath the skin, Argyriou said.
Having the cadavers is "like having
X-ray vision," she said, "because then you can see the
physics and see exactly why the pathology is painful."

The course also gives the residents a refresher of their basic
anatomy knowledge. "I haven't dissected since medical school, and
that was years ago, so it's nice to come back here and see it all
over again now that I have a better understanding of it,"
Argyriou said.

The anatomy lab experience is very different as a resident than
as a first-year medical student. First-year students are mostly
focused on identifying structures from their textbook, whereas
residents are interested in how the anatomy has clinical value,
said fourth-year resident Sugym Kim.

For Kim and other residents who are returning for their third or
fourth year, the lab is also a valuable teaching opportunity. It
helps the junior residents understand why they're learning the
anatomy, and how a musculoskeletal exam works, Kim said. And like
Olson, he doesn't see the course going out of style:

"Anatomy is the basic foundation of medical science," Kim said.
"It's just a basic, fundamental course you can't avoid or
substitute with anything else."